And as this azure water,
    Unflecked hy wave or foam,
Conceals in its tranquillity
    The dreaded white shark’s home,
So if love be illusion
    I ask the dream to stay,
Content to love by moonlight
    What I might not love by day.

Lallji my Desire

“This is no time for saying ‘no’”
    Were thy last words to me,
And yet my lips refused the kiss
    They might have given thee. 
                How could I know
                That thou wouldst go
                To sleep so far from me?

They took thee to the Burning-Ghat,
    Oh, Lallji, my desire,
And now a faint and lonely flame
    Uprises from the pyre. 
The thin grey smoke in spirals drifts
    Across the opal sky. 
Would that I were a wife of thine,
    And thus with thee could die! 
                How could I know
                That thou wouldst go,
                Oh, Lallji, my desire? 
                The lips I missed
                The flames have kissed
                Upon the Sandal pyre.

If one should meet me with a knife
    And cut my heart in twain,
Then would he see the smoke arise
    From every severed vein. 
Such is the burning, inward fire,
    The anguish of my pain,
For my Beloved, whose dying lips
    Implored a kiss—­in vain! 
                How could I know
                That thou wouldst go,
                Oh, Lallji, my desire? 
                Too young thou art
                To lay thy heart
                Upon the Sandal pyre.

Thy wife awaits her coming child;
    What were a child to me,
If I might take thee in these arms
    And face the flames with thee? 
The priests are chanting round the pyre,
    At dusk they will depart
And leave to thee thy lonely rest,
    To me my lonelier heart. 
                How could I know
                Thou lovedst me so? 
                Upon the Sandal pyre
                He lies forsaken. 
                The flames have taken
                My Lallji, my desire!

Rutland Gate

His back is bent and his lips are blue,
    Shivering out in the wet: 
“Here’s a florin, my man, for you,
    Go and get drunk and forget!”

Right in the midst of a Christian land,
    Rotted with wealth and ease,
Broken and draggled they let him stand
    Till his feet on the pavement freeze.

God leaves His poor in His vicars’ care,
    For He hears the church-bells ring,
His ears are buzzing with constant prayer
    And the hymns His people sing.

Can His pity picture the anguish here,
    Can He see, through a London fog,
The man who has worked “nigh seventy year”
    To die the death of a dog?